Awoken (13 page)

“Your stomach is costing more than my glasses.” Michael tapped the dark frames. “At least these have a purpose, not like that stupid baseball bat you wanted Diggs to buy.”

“I was thinking of self-defense.”

Michael snorted. “You were going to try using a baseball bat against VEN monsters? If you have a death wish, why not just throw yourself in front of a train?”

“Whatever,” Lina said. “Maybe some of us can’t throw rocks around with our brains.” The chime hanging above the diner’s front door gave a merry jingle.

Lina leaned out from the booth. “Speaking of ballet dancers…”

A portly waitress with a tight grey bun emerged from the swinging door behind the counter. Crossing the room, she greeted the four adolescent girls standing near the door and then led them to an empty table. The girls wore a colorful assortment of sequined dresses and glanced often at their glowing cell phones as they sat. They had their hair pinned back with shiny gold tiaras. After jotting down their orders on a yellow tablet, the waitress got the colorfully dressed quartet their drinks and then hustled back through the swinging doors into the kitchen.

“Why are they dressed like that?” Michael wondered aloud.

“They’re dancers,” Lina said, a tiny catch in her voice. “They must have just come from rehearsal.”

“How do you know? Maybe there’s a circus in town.”

One of the girls caught Michael staring and leaned over to her friends. Instantly, cell phones were lowered as all eyes turned to their booth.

Michael snatched up a menu and ducked down behind it. A burst of giggling came from the girls’ table, but he refused to look up.

“Wow,” Lina said. “I didn’t know you could do that.”

Michael tilted the menu down just enough so that he could see her face. “Do what?”

“Kind of neat really, better than moving marbles, anyway. Can you teach me?”

“What are you talking about?” Michael asked distractedly. He wasn’t even looking at them anymore. Why were they still giggling?

“Can you teach me to read upside down?”

“I can’t…oh, man,” Michael slapped the menu down on the table.

More giggling.

Lina’s eyes were wide and innocent. “What’s the matter, Mike? Didn’t you want the upside-down cake?”

“You’re a jerk.”

Lina spread her hands. “How did I know you couldn’t read upside down? Maybe you have an allergy or something. Have you been vaccinated against puppy love?”

The backpack rustled. “What is puppy love, Awoken? And when will this one have his name?”

“Be quiet, nosey,” Michael growled.

“This one will have the name no-see, Awoken?”

“Maybe you should see an eye specialist,” Lina suggested.

Michael nudged the backpack with his elbow. “No-see isn’t a name. Now, be quiet,” he hissed to the dollman. “And shut up, Lina.”

“This one does not wish to be quiet, Awoken.”

Lina nodded toward the table. “I should probably tell you. Those dancers are staring at you.”

“This one desires his name, Awoken.”

“Oh, for the love of—” Michael slapped the menu hard on the table, knocking over the saltshaker. An almost perfect line of white salt spilled across the menu, underlining the name spelled out in blocky letters on the cover.

Inspiration struck.

“Jericho,” Michael announced. “Your name is Jericho, not Lina, all right, or nosey, or whatever. I’m Michael, and you’re Jericho.”

The backpack shifted. “This one is…Jericho. You are Michael, the Awoken.”

“Close enough,” Michael said. “Now that you have a name, can you please be quiet?”

Lina smirked. “Why so snippy, Mike? Are you mad I mentioned the dancers were looking at you? Come on, what kind of friend would I be if I stood in the way of true love?”

“The kind who gets to keep her teeth.”

The door chimed again, and Lina leaned out once more for a look. “Diggs is back.”

“About time.” Michael brushed the salt from the menu and pushed it aside. “Maybe now we can get out of here.”

Diggs plopped down in the booth beside Lina. “Sorry to disappoint you, but we’ll be staying a while longer.”

Lina pushed away her plate. “You couldn’t find work?”

“The fellow who owns the car garage down the street said he’d have something for me on Monday.”

“Today is only Thursday,” Michael said. “We don’t have that kind of time.”

“I know. But the fella at the garage said he didn’t have anything for me until then.” Diggs nodded toward the dancers’ table. “There’s some kind of dance competition at the local high school. Seems like a pretty big event around here. First prize is five hundred dollars.”

Michael crossed his arms. “So we’re stranded, broke, and homeless until Monday?”

Diggs scratched his whiskers. “Unless you want to hitch the last hundred miles to the mountains, things sure look that way. With VEN out there, I wouldn’t suggest that route. Like it or not, we have to stay put until I can make some money.”

“Let me out.” Lina nudged the drifter.

Diggs let her out of the booth and then sat back down. “Where are you going?”

“Since we’re stuck anyway, I thought I’d do Romeo here a favor.” Throwing Michael a wink, Lina sauntered over to the dancers’ table.

Michael’s cheeks grew warm. “She wouldn’t.”

Leaning over their table, Lina said something to the girls. The dancers laughed. One of them offered Lina a chair, and she sat down.

Diggs helped himself to a piece of Michael’s pancake. “I think she just did.”

“I’ll murder her.”

After a few minutes of conversation involving unhealthy amounts of giggling, Lina excused herself from the table and came back to the booth.

“They seem to like you,” Diggs remarked as Lina sat down next to him.

“I think they like Mike more than me.” Lina grinned wickedly. “They want me to send him over.”

Michael laid his head down on the table. “Someone kill me.”

An angry growl came from the backpack. “Who threatens the Awoken?”

“Settle down, Jericho,” Michael said. “I was just venting.”

Diggs raised an eyebrow. “Who’s Jericho?”

“This one is Jericho,” answered the backpack. “The Awoken, who is Michael Or Just Mike, has so named this one.”

“Jericho?” Diggs took his pill bottle out of his pocket and unscrewed the cap. “You named him after a pancake house?”

“I was a little rushed, okay? Give me a break.” Michael lifted his head. “Looks like you’ve only got about ten of those pills left. Are they important?”

“Thirteen,” Diggs corrected, popping two of the tablets into his mouth. “Eleven now. And yes, they’re very important.”

“Well, you can buy more after tonight.” Lina wore a smug look. “I figured out a way to solve our money problem.”

Michael glanced over to the dancers. They were blowing kisses at him and giggling. “Are you going to kill me and collect on the life insurance?”

“No.”

“Then we still have a problem.”

Diggs’s cough sounded suspiciously like a laugh. “I have to agree, Melina. How is getting a date for Mike going to help our situation?”

Lina rolled her eyes. “Be serious, you two. I didn’t go over there to get Mike a date.”

Michael sat up straight. “You didn’t?”

“Of course not. I went over there to ask if it was too late to sign up for the competition.”

“You did what?” Michael exploded.

“They told me there’ve been a couple of last-minute cancellations, so finding me a spot shouldn’t be a problem,” she said. “And you, Mike, are going to make me a costume.”

“Good luck,” one of the dancers called. “See you on stage!”

Michael’s forehead banged back down on the table. “Somebody please kill me.”

The wind was warm and even, stroking his feathers like a soft brush as he scanned the streets below. A flash of instinct drew his gaze to a squirrel carcass someone’s tire had left tenderized on the street. Empty pain tightened A-12’s belly, but he didn’t descend for the inviting meal. The squirrel was not his objective, not his mission.

Soaring over the carcass, he flew for several miles before a flickering white sign and the smell of hot food triggered a recognition protocol. The building below was a restaurant. Like gas stations and motels, the diner was a location he was supposed to investigate.

He slapped his wings to his sides and plummeted.

A strange sensation, alien and exhilarating, filled him as he sliced down through the darkness. It had been like this since his first flight in the Farm aerie. Such meteoric drops from on high brought a contentment that was on par with a full stomach. The joyous feeling was as much a part of him as his feathers, or the cold metal filament lining his ribs.

His wings snapped out at the last second, catching the air and arresting his fall. After a quick series of flaps, he clamped his talons onto the glowing sign.

The door chimed below him, then opened. The oily mix of smells excreted from humanity wafted up to him as four females in glittering attire exited the building. A-12 opened his beak wide, drawing the scents into his modified olfactory glands.

Perfume, shampoo, sweat, nylon, diet cola…

A-12 cocked his head. There was something else, a faint trace that caused his twin hearts to quicken and his mismatched eyes to dilate.

The door chimed again. Three subjects, two male and one female, left the building. The smaller of the males smelled agitated.

“You two are nuts! I’m not going to do it.”

The new scent grew stronger in A-12’s olfactory receptors, triggering a recognition protocol in his frontal lobe. He stiffened.

“Don’t be such a baby,” the female said. “Just do as I say, and everything will be fine. I’ve been taking ballet since I was four, and attending dance camps since I was seven. Trust me, Michael, I’ve already got a killer routine. I was planning to perform it in the singles competition at camp. I’ve been rehearsing for the last two months.”

“I think she’s got a good idea, Mike,” said the larger male. “If Lina can win, we’ll save a lot of time.”

“You don’t…”

The smaller male stopped talking in midsentence, and looked back toward the restaurant.

A-12 huddled down, making himself as small as possible.

The larger male touched the smaller on the shoulder. “Is something wrong?”

The smaller male searched the darkness, his gaze crossing over A-12 at least twice without pause.

Finally, the smaller male shook his head. “I thought…never mind.”

The female slapped the smaller male on the back of the head. “Why are you being so stubborn?”

“Why are you being such an idiot?” the male countered.

The argument continued as the three subjects moved away.

“You’re the idiot. Why can’t you just do as you’re told?”

“Because you’re insane. You belong in a padded room with the rest of the…”

When the subjects were far enough away that A-12 no longer felt threatened with discovery, he straightened. Double-tapping his chest with his beak, he activated the monofilament disc beneath his skin. Stretching out his wings, he swooped after the three subjects, mismatched eyes glued to the small male. His beak opened wide, and a grating, un-birdlike sound emerged from A-12.

“
Pry-mare-eeeee
.”

“You’re making a big deal out of nothing, Mike,” Lina said.

The dressing room was a clutter of makeup, mirrors, and props from dozens of high school plays and musicals. Trunks and wardrobes packed with clothes lay piled against the walls, and a tall dressing screen stood in the corner.

Michael glared at the faded blue dress that hung over the top of the screen. “How many times do I have to say it? This isn’t going to work.”

“In the diner, you said merging with glass wasn’t dangerous around me.”

“I was talking about moving marbles, Lina. This is totally different. Besides, I don’t know the first thing about costume making.”

“Don’t be such a drama queen.” Lina’s T-shirt flopped over the top of the screen, and the dress disappeared. “We need this, Mike. I’ve been dancing for ten years. I’m good. Really good, actually. But that’s probably not going to be enough for me to win this thing. I haven’t practiced since getting this rock stuck in my hand. I haven’t even had time to stretch properly, so I’ll be a little stiff around the edges. Bottom line, we’re going to need a little extra something if we’re going to win this thing. I don’t know what kind of judges this school has, but a killer costume might just go a long way in glossing over a few minor mistakes. Plus, what else am I going to wear? I don’t even have a leotard.”

“I can’t just
make
things, Lina.”

A large straw sombrero bumped into Michael’s leg. “This one likes costumes, Awoken. May this one keep the costume?”

Michael nudged the hat away with his foot. “No. Put that back where you found it, Jericho.”

The giant hat tipped up, revealing Jericho’s petulant face. “Why can this one not keep the costume, Awoken? This one likes his costume.”

“Because I can’t fit that thing in my backpack,” Michael answered. “Plus, this is the third time you’ve run into me. You’re blind as a bat under there.”

“This one thinks you are jealous, Awoken,” Jericho huffed. The sombrero scampered away, bouncing off storage trunks and props with indignant principle. “This one has a better costume than Michael who is the Awoken.”

Lina stepped out from behind the screen. “What do you think?”

Michael’s mouth went dry, and he tried not to stare. The strapless dress fit well, molding to Lina’s body like a second skin from chest to hip before flaring out to a scandalous end halfway down her thigh. Lina looked fantastic, but the color of her dress was faded badly. Only the pristine, sheer, skin-tight white gloves that reached all the way to her elbows looked new.

Lina’s lips quirked upward at his expression. Suddenly, she swiveled her hips, causing the shockingly short hem of her dress to flare about her thighs. “You like?”

Clearing his dry throat, he said, “I think you should drop out now, before you embarrass yourself. That dress is so thin you can almost… well…”